They were in a forest, Dee registered. Faeydir had been running for what seemed like hours, following God knows what path or scent, and after crossing a few paddocks and weaving through a few lanes, they’d entered the forest proper. And Dee was none too happy with proceedings.
It would be getting dark soon, and she’d tried repeatedly to pull the wolf up, to reason with her, even tried to force a shift, only to get shoved back with a snarl and an onslaught of anger.
The problem was, despite being rather more intelligent and alert than the average wolf, Faeydir still lacked a lot of the human understanding of cause and effect. According to her, it was the doctor’s fault that the Noturatii had found them. Men in white coats were not to be trusted. Dee had had no luck at all explaining that it was likely just a coincidence, and that the doctor himself had nothing to do with it. The wolf simply wasn’t listening.
Like a child, Faeydir was also able to plan ahead a little, but not always able to see the consequences of her decisions, and with the light fading fast, Dee was dreading being stuck out here come nightfall. The nights were still freezing, and while she was dressed warmly, she could still freeze to death-
Oh. The image in her mind was clear and vivid. A makeshift den, maybe under a tree root, or inside a fallen log. Faeydir’s fur would keep them warm, and she might be able to catch a rabbit for dinner. They would be well taken care of, Faeydir told her, not at all offended by Dee’s lack of trust. She didn’t trust Dee any further, knowing full well that she didn’t understand Faeydir’s needs and desires as a wolf. And it was humbling, as well as eye opening, to suddenly be so completely dependent on the wolf’s skills.
Dee had never really been able to get her mind around the other shifters’ insistence that the wolf was an asset, and not just an ultra-fancy toy to play with. Then again, Dee thought darkly, if she hadn’t become a shifter, then she probably would never have been stuck out in the dark, in the cold, needing a coat of thick fur to survive the night. Still, she was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.
This was a good place, Faeydir reported suddenly, coming to a stop at the edge of a mossy clearing. A brief exploration turned up a deep puddle to drink from, a cosy nook underneath an overhanging rock – perfect for a makeshift den – and the scent of rabbits on the ground. Faeydir took the time to scent-mark the area, then padded off into the undergrowth, Dee watching her progress with a newfound respect and a sharp curiosity.
“Where the hell are they?” Baron snarled, all but ready to hurl his phone across the room. Night had fallen, the darkness thick without a moon tonight, and he’d been trying for the last hour and a half to reach his Den mates. Tank wasn’t answering, his phone just ringing out. Silas’s phone kept going straight to voicemail – which meant he was in wolf form, since no shifter out on assignment would ever turn their phone off – and Dee’s phone was simply ‘unavailable’ since she’d been lent a spare just for this excursion and no one had set up the voice mail on it.
“Where’s the van?” Every vehicle was fitted with a GPS tracker, and Skip had retreated to the office earlier to find it.
“Just south of Carlisle,” she reported, arriving back in the library. “And it’s stationary. Has been for hours.”
“Fuck.” He could feel Andre’s eyes on him, no doubt assessing his capabilities as alpha depending on how he chose to deal with this crisis. Three wolves MIA and one of them an untested newbie. That was bad enough, without the eyes of the entire Den on him. Once word had spread that the team hadn’t come back, the shifters had gradually congregated here in the library, a silent audience that was equal parts anxious concern and eager ferocity. It was heartening to know that each and every one of them was willing to drop everything and rally to the cause at a moment’s notice, but equally unnerving to have them all watching him when he didn’t know what the fuck he was supposed to do next.
Caroline was being unusually quiet. Normally she’d be tossing out ideas for finding them, sniping in his ear about how he could have let this happen, but she was sitting silently at one of the tables, legs crossed, her black leather making her look more of an assassin than the one the Council had sent to them.
“We need to search for them,” Baron said finally. It was the obvious choice, but not without its own risks. “Simon and Skip can go get the van. Check it out for bugs, bombs, mechanical tempering, the whole bit. Caleb can go with them. And you, Caroline. I’ll take Mark and Alistair and start at the clinic, see what we can find.” Mark had been pacing the room, understandably more agitated than the rest of the Den. He looked almost relieved at the announcement, no doubt eager to be out and doing something, rather than sitting around hoping his girlfriend magically came back on her own.
John, sitting in the corner ignoring the entire room, also looked up at the announcement, and Baron cast an uneasy eye over him. Should he…?
“John, you’re with me. You’re the best tracker in the Den, after Silas. We’re going to need you.” The predatory leer that appeared on John’s face was not at all reassuring.
“What about me?” Andre asked softly, and Baron held back a groan. Fucking politics.
“If you would like to join my team, your help would be most welcome,” he said, managing to be diplomatic.
“If I could make a suggestion? Perhaps you should leave Alistair behind. As I understand it, fighting is not one of his more refined skills.”
Fucking arsehole was calling one of his wolves weak? And in front of the man himself? Baron gritted his teeth. “Alistair comes,” he said, glancing at the man with a reassuring nod. “He’s a demon behind the wheel and he can drive the van while the rest of us do our thing. Everybody, be ready to leave in ten minutes.”
Dee was torn between being terrified and fascinated. Now that Faeydir had promised to look after them both, Dee was paying more attention to what she was doing and less to trying to get her to stop it. The scent of rabbit was strong – this was a path they used frequently, and up ahead they were likely to find a warren.
Faeydir crept along the path, her paws silent against the damp soil as she listened intently, focused on the scent trail, her thoughts on a tasty meal…
Without warning, a large wolf leapt out of the undergrowth, standing before them in open challenge. And Faeydir realised a moment later that there were two more flanking her, one on either side.
Run! Dee urged in her mind, terrified by their sudden appearance, but Faeydir paid the comment no heed. She simply stood there and watched the wolves come, hackles raised, teeth bared.
The three stopped, the leader coming to a halt just feet from where she stood, and Dee’s racing mind reminded her that there weren’t any wild wolves in England.
Right on cue, the wolf in front of her shifted, becoming a tall, black haired woman clad in buckskin and grey wool, a long knife in her hand only a moment after the shift was complete.
“Who are you?” she asked without preamble. “You trespass, and Il Trosa has no rights here.”
The Grey Watch. There was a tattoo on the woman’s left cheek, another on her left hand, and no hint of compromise in her eyes. In the months that she’d been with the Den, Baron had warned her repeatedly to avoid the Watch at all costs, and Dee was already planning escape routes, weighing up whether Faeydir could fight the three of them all at once.
But Faeydir seemed almost relieved to have met them. An image came to mind of a warm den smelling of earth and wolf, of low tents and a fireplace, simple tools like knives and axes set out neatly.
These wolves are dangerous! Dee told her urgently. But Faeydir disagreed. Wild wolves, these were, living outside without cages and rules. Open skies. Cold winters. Wide forests. This was where Faeydir had wanted to come ever since they’d escaped from the lab, and Dee’s heart sank as she realised that she’d be fighting an uphill battle to get them out of here.
Faeydir huffed at her, and Dee sighed inwardly. Well, okay. If she couldn’t leave by force, then she might as well try to negotiate instead. She was getting rather a lot of practice at that, after all.
I need to talk to them, Dee pointed out, and Faeydir agreed, on the condition that she be polite. These were friends, Faeydir insisted. A throwback to simpler times, more in touch with their wolf side than anyone in Il Trosa.
Oh hell, Dee thought as she shifted, her feet not quite willing to hold her steady as tiredness overtook her. Faeydir sounded like she wanted to stay, that she would try to convince Dee that this was a better option than her newfound friends at the Den. How the hell was she going to convince the stubborn animal that they needed to leave?
“I didn’t mean to trespass,” she said to the dominant female, cutting to the chase. “I was in town when the Noturatii showed up. I had to run away, and ended up here. I’m not even sure exactly where here is, but I assure you, I meant no offence.” It was an effort to refer to herself as ‘I’ instead of ‘we’, as had become her firm habit, but Baron had told her often enough that most shifters were a single, cohesive unit, and given her enough warnings about the Grey Watch to make her think it would be a bad idea to admit to her unusual condition.
Though, now that she thought about it, he’d never mentioned exactly why the Grey Watch were to be avoided. Given all the weirdness that routinely went on around the estate, she had a hard time believing that Baron was simply reacting to rumour and superstition. But the lack of details was disconcerting.
“You’re from Il Trosa?”
“Yes,” Dee admitted without hesitation. “I joined them last autumn.”
The two other wolves had so far remained in their animal form, but one of them shifted now, looked Dee over, and said something to the leader in a language Dee didn’t understand. The leader merely shook her head.
“A new recruit?”
“I suppose so, yes.”
“And yet you’re already a wolf. My understanding was that Il Trosa did not convert their newlings so quickly.”
Dee hesitated, wondering how much she should tell them. Her gut feeling was that honesty was her best policy, knowing that wolves were rather adept at detecting lies. “I was kidnapped by the Noturatii and converted in one of their labs. Il Trosa took me in after I escaped. They’ve been training me since then, but yes, I suppose I’m still rather new.”
The second shifter said something else, and the leader nodded. “And what were you doing just now?”
“Hunting for rabbits. I figured I’d be here for the night, and I was hungry…” Were they about to punish her for hunting in their territory?
“Are you alone?”
Dee hesitated. Answering that question, either truthfully or with a lie, could be equally dangerous. “Yes.”
The woman stared at her intently, as if trying to weigh the truth of her words. “You cannot be allowed to wander the forest alone,” she said finally. “Whatever your intentions were before, you’ll have to come with us. You’ll spend the night in our camp. But be warned,” she snapped, pointing her knife at Dee. “We are many, and we are fierce. We will not tolerate being toyed with.”
Dee nodded obediently. It was actually a relief of sorts to have met them. Okay, so being ‘escorted’ to their camp held a lot of risks in itself. But at least this way, if the Noturatii did manage to track her, she’d have help to fight them off. And Faeydir seemed happy with the outcome, eagerly shifting back into wolf form to follow the woman through the forest. It was a situation fraught with unknowns, a thousand potential mistakes and missteps waiting for her, but it was far from the worst situation Dee had ever been in.
She only hoped that come morning, Faeydir would see sense and agree to leave.
And that the Grey Watch would let her.